Shuttered East Boston church, convent site could become condo development

Developers Timothy White and Richard Egan have filed plans to turn the long closed Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Catholic Church at Gove and Frankfort streets into 14 condos and to demolish the rectory and convent across Gove to make way for a new six story building with 98 condos.

In their filing with the BPDA, the developers are proposing 84 parking spaces, which would be in a garage under the new building. About 15 units would be sold at the BPDA's definition of affordable rates.

They describe their plans for the church:

The Church Building will be the cornerstone of this development, respectfully reused and converted into spacious loft-style living units that capture the soaring interior spaces and volume of the building. There will be three levels of residential units with the top floor units capturing the currently hidden truss space above the vaulted ceiling. The exterior of the building, including its brick and stone façade, will be restored. It will be sensitively repaired where religious iconography was removed. The front door and side window openings will be lowered to the ground to better connect the building to the street and surrounding landscape. A reflective outdoor space that honors the church’s history will be crafted along the widened sidewalks at the corner of Frankfort and Gove streets. A new corner green space will be built at the corner of Gove and Lubec Streets to conceal parking for the Church Building units, while also creating a landscaped edge along Gove Street bringing much needed green space to the neighborhood.

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The two hope to begin construction in the fall of 2019 and have units ready for occupancy by the spring of 2021.

Comments

100 plus condo’s with no relief in sight for East Boston.
More condo’s = more vehicular Traffic , cars driving up and down Porter Street and Orleans Street, lets not forget the hotel they haven’t even started with yet , plenty of street parking spaces on Orleans street right now, but that will drastically change once these condos will be constructed, owners of condos will always have guests and those guests need a place to park and Orleans street has all the parking spaces.
Much more traffic along Bremen street corodor to Porter to Orleans streets.
It will be just like having Park N Fly on Bremen, heavy traffic..
What a mess..

The Blue Line is just as bad as traffic these days. Last winter, it wasn’t uncommon to have to wait 3 trains before getting on during the AM commute. It’s October and I’m already averaging 2, and have waited 3 twice in the last month.

Comes down to timing I’m sure, but left my house 10 mins late today and still ended up on the same train I normally end up on.

But yes, the lead is the Blue Line is reaching critical mass, and the ride or die T apolgists don’t get it.

To Kinopio, et al.: Yes, we need housing and places to put people. But we also need to be able to move those people from A to B. And yes, that means the T. But sometimes, or even all the time, some of us *GASP* may need or want a car. And regardless, building up this much housing in an area with a natural barrier that creates a bottleneck without any plan to alleviate is not the answer.

It's a function of (a) the signal/control system, (b) the possible acceleration/speed/braking (the actual train capacity as well as the layout of the line (curves, inclines, etc...and also the number/spacing of stations on a line) and how long a train needs in-station for boarding/disembarking (which is a function of demand, service frequency, available people-moving/storage space on the platform, and available people-moving/storage space on the train (including doors)

I did some temp agency work in NY & NJ about 20-25 years ago, including (sometimes traffic counts or people counts). I spent a week or two on some subway job - I remember the project Engineer explaining that to me and told me that on some of their lines (even with their signal system then - years before any location tracking or PTC) they could run service at 120-second intervals for high-demand periods.
I think he told me their theoretical best was somewhere a little less than 1 minute 45 seconds, but usually unattainable.

Yes, we have the newest cars (for another 10 minutes) and the most reliable service in terms of scheduling and actually showing up. But that doesn't have anything to do with the fact that trains are overcrowded, peoples' commutes are bottlenecking at Maverick, and that it's only getting worse and will continue to as we add more people.

There's a ton of traffic if I drive in to work, but I have a nice car and reliable parking options when I get there. By your logic, I should just drive in every day?

What I would prefer is that someone figure out how to address the transportation issues that Eastie being the new "it" neighborhood is causing. If they can scope out a %*$&[email protected]^ gondola for the Seaport with a straight face, maybe we can finally get the ferry service (no, Logan does not count) going?

I've been living in Eastie and commuting M-F during rush hour every day and only once have I ever had to wait for another train, and that was just because there was a signal issue that caused a severe backup. Which station are you experiencing that at? I get on/off at Airport, and even when we get to Maverick, I've never experienced a time where people couldn't get on. (Except for that one time)

People who want to live in Eastie, shouldn’t be able to live in Eastie because I might not be able to park my car near my apartment in Eastie for free. My opposition to new housing is in no way related to my desire for the value of my current apartment to continue rapidly escalating. Seriously, what’s a coupla extra hundred grand to me. I’m old school. Did you not notice my Park N Fly reference?

People who want to live in a specific neighborhood don't get to demand enough housing get built so they are affordable to anyone who decides they want to move there. A lot of people want to live places, that doesn't mean someone get just look at a specific neighborhood and demand locals put aside all concerns about new development and density. It's completely rational for property owners to care about their property values and traffic.